2 Up 1 down 2011 – 2013

Permanent video and sound installation at the University of Copenhagen,  Faculty of
Humanities 2010 – 2013

The installation consisting of 5 video monitors built into the wall of a 5 floor stairwell,
one on each floor. The monitors are in a vertical position. Above and below each monitor is
a loudspeaker, also built into the wall and covered with a perforated steel plate.

The work is in three parts, each of which consists of 5 x 40 minute loop repeated through
a whole day.

Day 1                                                                                                                                
Videos of people walking up stairs. The sound of footsteps is heard in the lowest speaker
on the ground floor.
A person appears in the ground floor monitor. It walks upwards, through
the monitor, disappears between the floors, and appears in the monitor on the next floor.
However, the video there is of another person, in another staircase. It continues up to the
next floor. The sound of footsteps follows the movement.  The different stairs have each
their own sound, which merge together between floors.  This process continues until the
person and the sound disappear up through the top floor monitor and speakers. During the
40 minute loop there are 8 ascents of people through the stairwell. Between ascents there
is a change of stairs in each monitor.

Day 2
All monitors show videos of elevator doors. An elevator is heard in the lowest speaker on
the ground floor.
It appears to be coming up from the cellar. The door in the ground floor
monitor opens. They close again, and the elevator continues up to the next floor, where
the door opens again. It is another elevator, in another building. The door closes and the
elevator continues up to the next floor. The process continues until the elevators and the
sound disappear up through the top floor monitor and speakers. In most cases the elevators
are empty.
Between ascents a new elevator door appears in each monitor.

Day 3
On the third day the movement is downward. All monitors show videos of walls. Objects fall
from the ceiling, down through all the monitors, and land with a crash in the cellar,
outside our field of vision. During the fall a faint  ̈swoosh” sound. is heard. Objects
fall 7 times through the stairwell during the 40 minute loop.  A different object falls in
front of each wall, but as in the stairs and elevator videos it is the continuation of the
movement and sound that makes it a whole.  Between drops a new wall appears in each monitor.

Each floor of the stairwell has its own shade of grey, gradating from the darkest shade on
the ground floor, to the lightest on the 4th floor.

The videos are in HD quality, a resolution of 1920 x 1080, and are played from 5 synchronized
media players on professional quality flat screen monitors. The overall length of the videos
is 10 hours. The work plays automatically from 7am until 1am.

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Lyftur two floors
 Stigi KolbeinnElevator 5.salDrop,bog6 still